16098

Rossini complete piano works (vol. 3) - Un petit Train de Plaisir.

GIACOMETTI, PAOLO - piano

Rossini

Awards

Edison Award 2001Música! 5 stars

Physical CD

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Details

This is now the third recording with which I continue my journey into the world of Rossini's later works. Here we have a Rossini who clearly enjoyed the closing years of his life, in his beloved Paris, which once again allowed him free rein for his brilliant creativity. One of the results of this freedom was an abundance of mostly shorter character pieces, which he jokingly referred to as "Pchs de Vieillesse", or "Sins of old age". These works are typified by their great diversity, and they are the expressions of an exceptional talent who had broken free of musical dogma: ironic, meditative, personal, and unafraid of disapproval or self-deprecation. All of these things can be heard in the works on this CD. For example, irony can immediately be seen in titles like "Valse Torture" (tortured waltz) or "chantillon de Blague Mlodique sur let noires de la main droite" (A sample of melodic nonsense on the black keys for the right hand). This unusual brand of humor is even more clearly marked in "Petit Caprice (Style Offenbach)" where Rossini targets the operettas of Offenbach which were so successful at the time, nor does he spare the pianist, giving the climaxes an almost absurd virtuosity with his use of difficult octave glissandi. The irony is even less restrained in "Des Tritons s'il vous Plat" (Some tritones please), a harmony exercise in disguise which immediately recalls the warming-up exercises of singers. But Rossini shows us a very different face in works like "chantillon du Chant de Nol l'italienne", intimate and meditative, a distant evocation of an Italian Christmas carol, or "Marche et Reminiscences pour mon dernier Voyage" (March and Reminiscences for my last journey).

Paolo Giacometti was born in Milan in 1970 and came with his parents to the Netherlands the next year. When he was nine years old he started piano lessons at the Music School in Hilversum with Joke Dekker-Vroons. He continued his studies with Jan Wijn at the Amsterdam Sweelinck Conservatory, where he was admitted directly to the Performance Musician Program. He graduated with honors in 1995. Paolo Giacometti has followed a number of Masterclasses with such eminent pianists and teachers as Gyrgy Sebk, Karl-Heinz Kmmerling, Marie Franoise Bucquet, Lazar Berman, John Perry and Detlef Kraus. He has successfully participated in various National and International Piano Competitions. In 1987 he was awarded First Prize at the Steinway Competition in The Netherlands qualifying thereby to take part in the International Steinway Festival the following year as the representative of the Netherlands. This in turn lead to an invitation to participate in the German Parke-Davis Frderpreis in Germany in 1990, which he won. In 1992 he participated in the prestigious International Brahms Competition in Hamburg where he was awarded the Second Prize.
In 1995 Paolo Giacometti was again awarded First Prize at the Postbank Sweelinck Competition and was invited to perform Brahms 2nd piano concerto together with the Amsterdam Conservatory Orchestra conducted by Kenneth Montgomery at various famous Dutch concert halls, including the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. Apart from many concerts in The Netherlands, Paolo Giacometti has given recitals in Italy, Germany and France. The last years he has also performes abroad together with the Dutch cellist Pieter Wispelwey.

() the pianist once again demonstrates an elegant and witty way with this ridiculously charming music, especially as rendered on the beautifull restores 1849 Erard that he plays. () () candy for the ears to consume without guilt. Fanfare